Before September, the EPA’s Science Advisory Board was composed of 47 scientists volunteering their time as public servants to help advise the agency on issues ranging from the safety of selected chemicals to the types of models used by the agency to sufficiently study emissions.

The process of becoming an SAB member has always come with full ethics disclosures and careful consideration of potential conflicts of interest, from all sources of funding, whether it’s an EPA grant or industry funding. Scientists with agency funding have served on the board ever since the SAB was first formed, and because EPA grants are awarded through a competitive, peer-reviewed process, the objectivity of scientists with EPA grant funding was not likely to be questioned. SAB members with conflicts pertaining to specific subjects have mitigated those by disclosing them and recusing themselves from conversations that might represent a conflict.

After nearly 40 years of operation, it appears that EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt has decided to change the rules of the SAB and possibly other advisory committees at the agency by ordering that no individuals receiving EPA grant funding can serve on the board. Why would the administrator of an agency whose mission is to protect public health and the environment actively work to ensure that some of our greatest minds wouldn’t be allowed to advise him on pressing scientific questions? No need to ask Pruitt, just ask his friends from the regulated community who have been working to turn conflict of interest on its head at the agency in the name of “balance.”

Trade group gets warm and fuzzy about “balance”

The Federal Advisory Committee Act, under which federal advisory committees operate, requires that committees are “fairly balanced,” and it’s up to the agency to determine what that means for each committee. For the EPA SAB, the 2017 charter and membership balance plan explicitly say that balance involves a “range of expertise required to assess the scientific and technical aspects of environmental issues.” For the SAB and CASAC, balance should not be a balance of opinions or interests in the EPA’s policy outcomes. The American Chemistry Council and other industry representatives disagree.

In March, the American Chemistry Council endorsed the EPA SAB Reform Act, writing, “The Science Advisory Board Reform Act would improve the peer review process—a critical component of the scientific process used by EPA in their regulatory decisions about potential risks to human health or the environment. The Act would make peer reviewers accountable for responding to public comment, strengthen policies to address conflicts of interest, ensure engagement of a wide range of perspectives of qualified scientific experts in EPA’s scientific peer review panels and increase transparency in peer review reports.” The press contact on this release? Liz Bowman. Yes, the same Liz Bowman who is now a spokeswoman at the EPA. A cherry on top of the revolving door sundae.

After the bill passed the House in March, the ACC wrote again, “We urge the Senate to take up the bill and are committed to working with Congress to advance legislation that will enhance accountability and ensure appropriate balance in EPA’s peer review process.”

In May, the American Chemistry Council responded to Pruitt’s dismissal of BOSC members by saying, “A number of people and groups have been concerned in the past the membership of EPA’s scientific advisory boards lacked diversity: diversity of interests, diversity of scientific disciplines, and diversity of backgrounds, resulting in a narrow or biased perspective concerning issues EPA was researching,” Openshaw said. “Everyone benefits when regulations are based on the best available science.”

After the nominees were announced in September, the Heartland Institute told E&E news that: “We applaud any effort by Administrator Pruitt to bring qualified non-alarmist scientists onto the EPA’s advisory boards. There is a vigorous debate over the causes and consequences of climate change, and it’s vital that EPA acknowledge that fact and have a more balanced approach to the agency’s rule-making.”

What’s in store for the SAB?

The new SAB will consist of five fewer members than it did before, operating with 42 instead of 47 members. According to its new charter, it will also meet fewer times, 6-8 instead of 8-10 each year. While there may be representation from more states in the name of diversity, the number of women scientists on the committee has been slashed by half from nearly 21 to just 10. The decision not to renew the terms of six individuals who had already been fully vetted and were qualified to serve again also breaks with precedent. Additionally, rather than appoint a current SAB member as chair as has been done in the past, it appears that Michael Honeycutt from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality will be leading this new board’s deliberations. Honeycutt was one of the individuals I urged Pruitt not to choose last month. Clearly, that plea fell on deaf ears.

The number of industry representatives on the SAB has more than doubled, which doesn’t include the individuals from consulting firms or state governments who have long histories of working very closely with the private sector.

New member Donald van der Vaart wrote an op-ed in 2015 criticizing the North Carolina Attorney General for his support of the Clean Power Plan, which van der Vaart called an “act of overreach” and “federal intrusion.” He supported Myron Ebell as a suitable leader to run the EPA transition team. He later wrote a letter to President-elect Trump, alleging that the EPA has “run out of control,” is “agenda-driven” and an “autocrat.”

Also on the list are S. Stanley Young and Richard Smith, two of the co-authors on this paper, whose thinking on air pollution science is far outside the mainstream, ignoring long-held and understood concepts about air pollution and health risks.

The American Chemistry Council achieved its request for so-called “balance” to include more industry perspectives on the board, and gained an inside look at the SAB, as long-time staffer Kimberly White will also be a member.

These individuals are likely to dramatically skew science advice to the EPA in a way that will support Pruitt’s decisions to loosen pollution regulations and emissions standards. A hit on the quality of science advice at the EPA is a direct threat to our health and safety.

Fixing advisory committees to reach predetermined conclusions

Last week we introduced the plays of the Disinformation Playbook, often used by companies and trade associations to manipulate or suppress science in order to achieve a specific policy outcome. The way in which Scott Pruitt is stacking the Science Advisory Board to manipulate the science advice process is an example of “The Fix.” Unfortunately, we’ve already seen several examples of this play used by the likes of Dow Chemical Co. and the American Chemistry Council to cast doubt on the science to delay or obstruct public health and safety provisions just within the EPA in the past year.

In light of this blatant attack on independent science at the EPA, we’re calling on Congress to conduct oversight at the agency and to investigate Scott Pruitt’s actions with the SAB, CASAC, and BOSC as potential interference in the scientific process. Join us by signing onto this letter.

Football was not just the most important social activity on weekends in New Jersey growing up, but it was woven into the family and community in which I grew up. My dad played football in his small town Vermont high school along with his older brother who went on to play college football at the University of Vermont. Hence, weekends at the Reed household were for screaming at TV sets or from real-life bleachers and theatrical displays of cheering played out in falling off of couches and crashing onto floors.

Football players have always carried a sort of badge of honor for playing America’s favorite sport, but it wasn’t until recently that that badge began to carry even more weight due to emerging knowledge about what even just a few years of executing football plays could mean for their quality of life down the line.

Even if you don’t closely follow football, you are likely aware that the NFL has been at the center of the news cycle in recent months, with players kneeling during the playing of the national anthem to protest racial injustice and police brutality. The players’ protest has drawn fire from a number of directions, including the White House. (Here at UCS, our staff joined with the campaign #scientiststakeaknee, supporting these players’ right to protest and the importance of their cause.)

But these protests aren’t the only way that the NFL has come into the spotlight. It’s increasingly clear that the repeated head injuries many football players experience can cause long-term damage—but the NFL has worked hard to bury these facts.

The NFL’s foray into CTE science

A powerful slide from Dr. Ann McKee’s presentation summarizing her findings on CTE at the Powering Precision Health Summit. The BU Brain Bank most recently analyzed 111 brains of former NFL players, finding that all but one had signs of CTE.

The NFL spent years, beginning in the 1990s, working to control the science behind the health consequences of repeated head injuries incurred while playing football. By doing so, the company infringed on its players’ right to know and ability to make informed decisions about their health and career paths. And as the NFL failed to do its due diligence to conduct honest science on the game, players were consistently told to return to play after collisions only to be left with debilitating health issues and devastated family members.

The NFL’s actions closely track with the tobacco and fossil fuel industries, and include examples of just about every tactic in our “Disinformation Playbook,” which are documented in Steve Fainaru and Mark Fainaru-Wada’s 2013 book, League of Denial. Just a few uses of the plays include:

The Fake: The NFL commissioned a Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (MTBI) committee that published a series of studies in the journal Neurosurgery in the early 2000s, which downplayed the risks of repeated head injuries by cherrypicking data and using incomplete data on the number of concussions that were reported during games.

The Blitz: Bennett Omalu, the pathologist who first discovered CTE in an NFL player, faced opposition from the NFL which called for the retraction for his article on the subject in 2005 and then called his second study “not appropriate science” and “purely speculative.” The second chair of NFL’s brain injury committee, Ira Casson, later attacked and mocked Boston University neuropathologist, Dr. Ann McKee, for her work on CTE.

The Diversion: Ira Casson acquired the nickname “Dr. No” by the authors of League of Denial as he willfully refused to accept that repeated head injury could lead to long-term brain damage in football players, even though he spent years studying boxers and had concluded that the sport was associated with brain damage. In a 2010 Congressional hearing on football brain injuries, he held tight to his denial of the link, telling members of Congress that, “My position is that there is not enough valid, reliable or objective scientific evidence at present to determine whether or not repeat head impacts in professional football result in long term brain damage.”

The Fix: The NFL was able to manipulate processes in order to control the science on head injuries sustained while playing football. The editor-in-chief of the journal Neurosurgery in which all of the MTBI’s studies were published was Dr. Michael Apuzzo, a consultant for an NFL football team. The peer review process for this journal, unlike others, allowed papers to be published even if reviewers were harshly critical and rejected the science as long as the objections were published in the commentaries section of the paper. Despite harsh criticism from reviewers who were prominent experts in the field, Dr. Julian Bailes and Dr. Kevin Guskiewicz, the MTBI got away with publishing a series of papers downplaying the health risks of playing football.

In 2016, the NFL finally admitted that there was a link between playing football and the development of degenerative brain disorders like CTE after denying the risks for over a decade. The NFL has since changed some of its rules and has dedicated funding to help make the game safer for players, protections that President Trump argues are “ruining the game.” Trump’s blatant disregard of the evidence on the health impacts of playing football is beyond disappointing but not at all surprising, considering the way that this administration has treated science since day one.

From NFL player to science champion

Chris and I behind the scenes after a full day filming the PSA this August.

I have been fortunate to meet and spend time with former NFL player and science champion, Chris Borland, who has turned his frustration with the league into support for independent science on the impacts of playing football for its child and adult players. Yesterday, he spoke at a scientific conference on the role of the media and others in communicating the CTE science to the general public, so that we all have a better understanding of the risks of playing football, especially during youth. He also spoke about the emerging science on biomarkers that will help diagnose CTE in living players in the near future.

Here’s Chris’s take on why we should be standing up for science and exposing and fighting back against the disinformation playbook:

Chris and I are also featured on this week’s Got Science? podcast. Listen below:

In carrying out plays from the Playbook to sideline science, companies like the NFL break a simple social responsibility to “do no harm.” Take a look at our brand new website detailing the case study of the NFL along with 19 other examples of ways in which companies or trade organizations have manipulated or suppressed science at our expense, and find out how you help us stop the playbook.

When I was 13, this is what I identified as the hardest thing about life then. My trust issues were just beginning to manifest themselves.

I have always had a healthy dose of curiosity and skepticism and a desire to hold people accountable for their statements built into my DNA. Usually, these were borne out in letter-writing campaigns. As a child, I sent a series of letters to the Daily News because I believed its campaign of “No More Schmutz!” was falling short after rifling through the pages and still having gray smudges on my fingers. Inky fingers is a far cry from misinformation about the dangers of fossil fuel pollution, but overall, my general pursuit for the truth hasn’t changed.

My newest project at the Center for Science and Democracy released today is a website that exposes the ways in which companies seek to hide the truth about the impacts of their products or actions on health and the environment. By calling out the plays in the “Disinformation Playbook,” we hope to ensure that powerful companies and institutions are not engaging in behavior that would obstruct the government’s ability to keep us safe, and at the very least aren’t doing us any harm. Unfortunately, as our case studies show, there are far too many examples in which companies and trade organizations have made intentional decisions to delay or obstruct science-based safeguards, putting our lives at risk.

In the Disinformation Playbook, we reveal the five tactics that some companies use to manipulate, attack, or create doubt about science and the scientists conducting important research that appears unfavorable to a company’s products or actions. We also feature twenty case studies that show how companies in a range of different industries have used these tactics in an effort to sideline science.

While not all companies engage in this irresponsible behavior, the companies and trade associations we highlight in the playbook have acted in legally questionable and ethically unsound ways. Here are five of the most egregious examples from the Playbook:

In an attempt to reduce litigation costs, Georgia-Pacific secretly ran a research program intended to raise doubts about the dangers of asbestos and stave off regulatory efforts to ban the chemical. The company used knowingly flawed methodologies in its science as well as publishing its research in scientific journals without adequately disclosing the authors’ conflicts of interest. By seeding the literature with counterfeit science, Georgia-Pacific created a life-threatening hazard by deceiving those who rely on science to understand the health risks of asbestos exposure. While asbestos use has been phased out in the US, it is not banned, and mesothelioma still claims the lives of thousands of people very year.

Rather than honestly dealing with its burgeoning concussion problem, the National Football League (NFL) went after the reputation of the first doctor to link the sport to the degenerative brain disease he named Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. What Omalu found in Mike Webster’s brain—chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a progressive degenerative disease mainly associated with “punch drunk” boxers and victims of brain trauma—broke the NFL’s burgeoning concussion problem wide open. But instead of working with scientists and doctors to better understand the damaging effect of repeated concussions and how the league could improve the game to reduce head injuries, the NFL went after the reputation of Omalu and the other scientists who subsequently worked on CTE. Just this year, Boston University scientists released a study of 111 deceased former NFL players’ brains, revealing that all but one had signs of CTE.

The top lobbyist for the fossil fuel industry in the western United States secretly ran more than a dozen front groups in an attempt to undermine forward-looking policy on climate change and clean technologies. As a leaked 2014 presentation by Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA) President Catherine Reheis-Boyd revealed, WSPA’s strategy was to use these fabricated organizations to falsely represent grassroots opposition to forward-looking policy on climate change and clean technologies. WSPA and its member companies oppose science-based climate policies that are critically needed to mitigate the damaging impacts of global warming.

Coca-Cola quietly funded a research institute out of the University of Colorado designed to persuade people to focus on exercise, not calorie intake, for weight loss. Emails between the company and the institute’s president suggested Coca-Cola helped pick the group’s leaders, create its mission statement, and design its website. A growing body of scientific evidence links sugar to a variety of negative health outcomes, including diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and high cholesterol. Coca-Cola’s actions overrode sensible transparency safeguards meant to ensure the independence of research—and allow consumers to understand the risks of sugar consumption for themselves.

After meeting with and listening to talking points from chlorpyrifos producer Dow Chemical Company, the EPA announced it would be reversing its decision to ban the chemical that is linked to neurological development issues in children. In 2016, the EPA concluded that chlorpyrifos can have harmful effects on child brain development. The regulation of chlorpyrifos is additionally an environmental justice issue. Latino children in California are 91 percent more likely than white children to attend schools near areas of heavy pesticide use.

The secret to a good defense is a good offense

By arming ourselves with independent science, we can fight back against these familiar tactics. Granted, it’s not an easy task, especially in the face of a government run by an administration that doesn’t appear to value evidence, believing asbestos is 100% safe and claiming that climate change is a hoax. I hear powerful stories every day of communities working together to crush corporate disinformation campaigns with the hard truth.

Just a couple of weeks ago, community members from Hoosick Falls, New York attended the hearing for “toxicologist-for-hire,” Dr. Michael Dourson, the nominee to head up the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention. Senator Kristen Gillibrand paid homage to their bravery, “The water that they drink, the water they give their children, the water they cook in, the water they bathe in, is contaminated by PFOA. These families are so frightened.” These individuals had a powerful story to tell about the way in which DuPont downplayed the dangers of the chemical byproduct of Teflon, C8 or PFOA, and Dourson’s consulting firm, hired by DuPont, recommended a far lower standard for the chemical than most scientists believe would have protected exposed residents from harm.

We hope that reading through the playbook will encourage you to stand up for science and join us as we continue to challenge companies that attempt to sideline science, seeking business as usual at our expense. Become a science champion today and take a stand against corporate disinformation by asking your members of congress not to do automakers’ bidding by rolling back valuable progress on vehicle efficiency standards.

Stay curious, stay skeptical, and together we can work toward making corporate culture more honest and transparent by raising the political cost of using the disinformation playbook.

When it comes to conflicts of interest, few nominations can top that of Michael Dourson to lead the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention. Time after time, Dourson has worked for industries and against the public interest, actively downplaying the risks of a series of chemicals and pushing for less stringent policies that threaten our safety.

In short, Dourson pushes counterfeit science, is unfit to protect us from dangerous chemicals, and is a toxic choice for our health and safety.

A litany of toxic decisions

Consider the 2014 Freedom Industries chemical spill into the Elk River in Charleston, West Virginia, which contaminated drinking water supplies for 300,000 people with MCHM and PPH—two chemicals used to clean coal.

After the spill, Dourson’s company, TERA, was hired by the state to put together a health effects panel; Dourson was the chair. He did not disclose the fact, however, that he had been hired to work for the very same companies that manufactured those chemicals, a fact that only later came out while he was being questioned by a reporter.

Dourson was also involved in helping set West Virginia’s “safe” level in drinking water for a chemical used to manufacture Teflon (Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), or “C8”). It was 2,000 times higher than the standard set by the EPA.

In 2015, Dourson provided testimony for DuPont in the case of a woman who alleged that her kidney cancer was linked to drinking PFOA-contaminated water from the company’s Parkersburg, WV plant. Just this year, DuPont settled with plaintiffs from the Ohio Valley who had been exposed to PFOA from the same plant for $670 million after an independent C8 Science Panel made up of independent epidemiologists found “probable links” between PFOA and kidney and testicular cancer, as well as high blood pressure, thyroid disease, and pregnancy-induced hypertension.

From 2007 to 2014, Dourson and TERA also worked closely with Michael Honeycutt and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to loosen two-thirds of the already weak protections for 45 different chemicals.

The list of toxic decisions made by Dourson and his team goes on and clearly makes him an unacceptable choice for a leadership role at the agency charged with protecting public health and the environment.

A worst-case choice

During Dourson’s hearing before the Senate Committion on Environment and Public Works (EPW), his answers to questions about recusing himself from decisions regarding former chemicals on which TERA has worked closely with industry were cagey at best. It appears that because much of his work was through the University of Cincinnati, he will not be expected to recuse himself from decisions about chemicals that his research team was paid by industry to assess in the past. His ethics agreement confirms this. So much for the Trump administration’s draining of the swamp.

If Dourson is confirmed, I have no doubt that his appointment will be repeatedly cited as a worst-case-scenario of the revolving door between industry representatives and the government.

His work over the past few decades has been destructive enough, even from a position with little power to help the chemical industry directly skirt tough regulations. While Dourson has apparently already been working at the agency as “adviser to the Administrator,” putting him in charge of the office that is supposed to protect the public from toxins would be a grave mistake with national ramifications.

In the coming years, Dourson’s office will be making decisions about safety thresholds and key regulatory actions on chlorpyrifos, neonicotinoids, flame retardants, asbestos, and the other priority chemicals under the Toxic Substances Control Act. There is no room for error, and unfortunately, error is likely with someone like Dourson in charge.

We join with many other members of the scientific community to oppose Michael Dourson for Assistant Administrator of OCSPP and to ask senators to vote no in upcoming committee and confirmation votes.

In another frustrating example of undermining science-based protections, the FDA this morning proposed delaying compliance for revisions to the Nutrition Facts label.

Most food companies were supposed to roll out their revised labels by July 2018. This delay would mean that those initial, larger companies would have until January 2020 and smaller companies until January 2021.

I have been dreading this official announcement all year and hoping—as more and more products I see in stores have updated their labels—that the FDA would acknowledge that its original rule was perfectly reasonable and has already given companies ample time to comply.

In December, food industry leaders proposed two different riders to draft House appropriations legislation that would have delayed the rule. Luckily, those failed to make it into final language.

Then, in April at now-FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb’s confirmation hearing, he implied that he might delay the revised nutrition facts label. I urged Gottlieb to keep the compliance dates as a part of the final rule that was issued in 2016.

Once confirmed, Gottlieb was faced with what I would consider a pretty clear-cut decision: Implement a rule that was based in clear science on the public health consequences associated with excessive added sugar consumption—one that was also supported by the expert-driven Dietary Guidelines recommendations—or cow to industry wishes to delay the rule, even though the majority of food companies would have had until 2019 to make the new changes to their labels, and larger food companies like Mars, Inc. and Hershey Co. have already met the deadline or are on track to meet it.

A few months later, the FDA announced of its intention to push back compliance dates, but there was no formal decision or indication of how long the delay would be. I, again, urged Gottlieb not to take a step backward on food label transparency by delaying the new label.

Despite what some food companies will have you believe, they have had plenty of time to accept the science on added sugar consumption and to give consumers the information for which they’ve been clamoring. The FDA first began its work to revise the nutrition facts label in 2004, and the proposed rule which included the added sugar line was issued in 2014. Industry has had over ten years to give consumers the information they want to make informed decisions, and to acknowledge the mounting evidence that excessive sugar consumption can lead to adverse health consequences, including heart disease, obesity, diabetes, and hypertension.

Instead, as we demonstrated in a 2015 analysis of public comments on the FDA’s proposed rule, the majority of unique comments supported the rule (99 percent of whom were public health experts), while 69 percent of those opposed to the rule were from the food industry. The companies’ reasons for opposition included flimsy arguments about consumers’ ability to understand nutrition labels.

Last week, we signed onto a letter along with twenty other science, public health, and consumer organizations urging Gottlieb to let the rule move forward. As we wrote in the letter, this delay means that “an entire cycle of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans will have passed without the federal government’s premier public-health regulatory agency taking final action to implement a major recommendation of the Guidelines.”

It also means that consumers will have to continue to guess how much of the sugar in their food is added, gambling on healthy food purchasing decisions. While asking the agency to delay its labeling rules, the sugar industry seems to understand that it’s actually time to reformulate and meet consumer demand for healthier products to win consumers’ trust. A surefire way to win our trust would have been to move forward with the label, not force us to wait another year and a half for information we have the right to know.

The FDA’s failure to follow the science and listen to public health experts, including HHS staff who helped write the most recent Dietary Guidelines, is incredibly disappointing. We will be weighing in on this decision with comments that will be accepted for 30 days after October 2nd and will update you on how you can tell the FDA to rescind its rule to delay the enforcement dates for added sugar labeling.

In its effort to fill fifteen positions on the Science Advisory Board, the EPA has posted a list of 132 nominees to be a part of the esteemed EPA Science Advisory Board (SAB). The SAB is a group of over forty scientists, experts in a range of disciplines, who provide peer review and expert advice on EPA issue areas.

While many of the nominees are highly qualified and distinguished in their fields, there are a handful of individuals that are extremely concerning due to their direct financial conflicts, their lack of experience and/or their historical opposition to the work of the EPA in advancing its mission to protect public health and the environment.

The SAB was established by the Environmental Research, Development, and Demonstration Authorization Act of 1978 and operates as a federal advisory committee under the Federal Advisory Committee Act of 1972. Note that board members should be experts in their fields, with the training and experience to evaluate EPA-relevant scientific and technical matters. Source: U.S. GPO

Many of these concerning individuals were nominated by Heartland Institute—an organization that has actively worked to sow doubt about climate change science—and have the seal of approval by Trump EPA transition team member and Heartland staffer, Steve Milloy. When interviewed about some of the names on the nominee list, Milloy said that he is glad that EPA administrator Scott Pruitt is in office since he’ll be brave enough to reconstitute the SAB. A “thumbs up” from Milloy is an immediate red flag for me.

My colleague, Andrew Rosenberg, categorized questionable political appointees in three distinct buckets: the conflicted, the opposed, and the unqualified. The same can be said of nominees for the SAB. You don’t have to dig too deep to find individuals who may appear to be qualified on paper, but have a track record of undermining the work of the EPA and advancing policies that benefit special interests over the general public. Appointing these individuals to the SAB would be in direct opposition to the critical work of the SAB itself and to the EPA’s mission.

Take Dr. Michael Honeycutt, lead toxicologist at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, for example. Industry representatives, including at the American Chemistry Council, ExxonMobil, and the Texas Oil and Gas Association launched a campaign to get Honeycutt appointed to the CASAC in 2016, which fortunately was unsuccessful. Now Honeycutt’s name is on the list for the SAB.

He co-authored an article in 2015 that argued that available science did not support the EPA’s assertion that tighter ozone standards would provide significant public health benefits. In criticizing the scientific studies used by the EPA, Honeycutt has cherrypicked studies to exaggerate uncertainty on risks of ozone pollution, including making hay of the argument that ozone pollution isn’t a huge issue because “most people spend more than 90 percent of their time indoors,” which has been picked up and spouted off by climate deniers, like Michael Fumento.

Honeycutt has spent his career at TCEQ politicizing the EPA and actively working to obstruct science used to inform important standards at the agency, so it seems out of character for him to want so badly to be a member of an EPA science advisory committee. Unless, of course, he is interested in the platform or the ability to provide formal advice to his personal friend, Michael Dourson.

What does Honeycutt have in common with fellow nominee, Dr. John Graham? Under Graham’s leadership in January 2006, The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released a proposed Risk Assessment Bulletin which would have covered any scientific or technical document assessing human health or environmental risks.

OMB asked the National Academy of Sciences’ National Research Council (NRC) to conduct an independent review of the document. Its study gave the OMB a failing grade, calling the guidance a “fundamentally flawed” document which, if implemented, would have a high potential for negative impacts on the practice of risk assessment in the federal government. Among the reasons for their conclusions was that the bulletin oversimplified the degree of uncertainty that agencies must factor into all of their evaluations of risk. This idea for standardized risk assessment is of interest to regulatory reform advocates like Graham and has made its way into the dangerous Regulatory Accountability Act in Congress and into the new toxic substances rules under the Frank Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act that Graham’s protégé and former ACC staffer, Nancy Beck, is now crafting from her position as Deputy Assistant Administrator of the EPA.

Before his stint at OMB, Graham led the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis, which notably skewed risk analyses in favor of industry: costs saved by not regulating versus lives saved regulating. In one case, Graham’s OMB rejected a National Highway Transportation Safety Administration rule that would reduce the toll of vehicle rollovers by requiring that automakers install tire pressure warning systems. Graham made this decision despite the direct conflict of interest as his Harvard think tank was funded by General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co., Volvo Car Corp. and the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers.

Another individual that the SAB should steer clear of is Dr. Richard Belzer, an agricultural economist and, like Graham, is a cost-benefit-analysis enthusiast who worked for the OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) from 1988 to 1998. In 2000, Belzer criticized SAB’s role in peer reviewing the EPA’s evaluation of costs and benefits of the Clean Air Act. Belzer and his co-author called SAB’s reviews “ineffective” because, in their opinion, they couldn’t force the agency to change the direction of policy.

Belzer appears to misunderstand the purpose of the SAB which is to simply advise the agency on its science. The EPA has the discretion to heed that advice and apply it to policies. SAB members are not decision-makers, they are esteemed scientists whose expertise is best suited to evaluate scientific considerations, not political ones. In 2010, Belzer participated in a panel on “The EPA’s Ambitious Regulatory Agenda” sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute, the description of which includes the erroneous statement: “all major EPA decisions are contentious.” According to his bio, his clients include ExxonMobil and American Chemistry Council. And speaking of American Chemistry Council…

Kimberly White, senior director of chemical products and technology at the ACC is among those nominated to serve on the SAB. She has been summoned by House Science Committee Majority Staff, Lamar Smith, to testify at the hearing called “Making EPA Great Again” earlier this year where she spoke about the need to improve the SAB’s transparency and peer review methods and accused the EPA of being too involved in the SAB’s peer review process: “conversations that are happening in that peer review get stymied by [the] EPA’s input during the peer-review process so it’s not as independent as it should be.”

She also agreed when one member of congress suggested that the SAB was not truly balanced and that there should be a devil’s advocate on the committee. Perhaps Dr. White wants to fill that very role. The problem with that, however, is that the American Chemistry Council and her previous employer, the American Petroleum Institute, are organizations that actively work to spread disinformation about a range of scientific topics to thwart the EPA’s work to keep us safe. Dr. White has criticized an EPA assessment on formaldehyde, for example, because it wasn’t inclusive enough of science. Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen and thanks in large part to ACC, the EPA’s emissions standard for wood products set to be enforced in December has been delayed at least four months.

Who Pruitt appoints for the fifteen open positions will be a test to see whether he is going to continue seeking exclusive counsel from polluters. There are a handful of qualified scientists who have only served one term that can be easily reappointed for a second, which is common practice for the board. For the sake of continuity, it would behoove Pruitt to keep those experts on. For the other positions, it would be in the agency’s best interest for Pruitt to choose a balanced roster of new members from the dozens of well-qualified scientists on the list, rather than stack the committee with folks who have spent their careers working to undermine the mission of the EPA and weaken policies that are supposed to keep us safe.

All members of the public can submit comments encouraging the EPA to appoint independent and qualified scientists as advisors. You have until Thursday, September 28th at 11:59pm to email your comment to Thomas Carpenter, the Designated Federal Officer of the SAB, at carpenter.thomas@epa.gov.

In a stunning victory for consumer safety and a powerful display of the ability of independent science to spur policy change, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) voted this week to ban a class of additive, polymeric organhalogen flame retardants (OFRs) that are present in many consumer products. Last week, I was one of many individuals who testified before the CPSC urging the body to grant a petition to ban the class of organohalogen flame retardants from four classes of consumer products: mattresses, children’s products, furniture, and electronic casings.

Of the 31 individuals who testified last week, there were only two individuals who advised the CPSC not to ban OFRs: representatives from the American Chemistry Council (ACC) and the Information Technology Industry Council. As Commissioner Marietta Robinson pointed out during the hearing, the only comments opposing the ban “represent those with a financial interest in continuing to have these potentially toxic, and some of them definitively, toxic, chemicals in our environment.” She also noted that the presentations by those opposed to the petition were not transparent and used materials relating to chemicals that were irrelevant to the petition, a drastic contrast to the numerous scientists and scholars whose heavily footnoted statements provided evidence to support the arguments of the well-bounded petition.

Scientific information trumps corporate disinformation

Commissioner Robert Adler, who submitted the motion to grant the petition, compared the chemical industry’s talking points at the hearing on reasons not to ban OFRS to the tobacco industry’s same denial of the health impacts of smoking. His statement read, “if we took the tobacco industry’s word on cigarette safety, we would still be waiting. Similarly, we have waited for years for our friends the chemical industry to provide us with credible evidence that there are safe OFRS. I have little doubt that we will still be waiting for many years, to no avail.” Sadly, he’s probably right.

We have seen this trend time and time again. Whether it was the tobacco industry, the asbestos industry, the sugar industry, the PCB industry, the agrochemical industry, the pharmaceutical industry, and the oil and gas industry, corporate bad actors have known about risks of their products and have chosen not to act to protect the public for years, sometimes decades. Not only do they deny that there is harm, but they actively push for policies that allow them to conceal the truth for even longer. As Oxford University’s Henry Shue wrote about fossil fuel companies like Exxon in a recent Climatic Change article, noting that “companies knowingly violated the most basic principle of ‘do no harm.’” It is unethical and unacceptable that the public is not afforded the information we deserve on the harms of products we are exposed to every day in the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, and everything in between.

A 2008 EPA literature review on polybrominated diphenyl ethers, one type of OFR, found that 80 percent of total exposure to the chemical by the general population is through ingestion and absorption of house dust containing these chemicals. (Photo: Flickr/Tracy Ducasse)

Case in point: ACC’s statement after the CPSC’s vote included sticking to its talking points and pivoting from whether OFRs are safe to whether they reduce fire risk. During the hearing, the ACC representative argued that the petition was overly broad and that there was insufficient data on each OFR to ban them as a class. However, when asked by Commissioners for evidence that certain OFRs did not cause harm, he was unable to point to a specific chemical or cite relevant research. At a certain point, there is no place to pivot when the facts are stacked against you.

Dust is something I never gave much thought to growing up. If anything, “dusting” was always my favorite chore when faced with the options of vacuuming or washing the dishes. I never really gave much thought to what that elusive substance was composed of. I certainly wouldn’t have guessed that within those seemingly innocuous dust bunnies hiding behind bookshelves were a mix of chemicals that could impact my health. Dusting has taken on new meaning for me since conducting research on flame retardants.

For decades now, consumers have been left powerless and at the whim of manufacturers who have decided for us what chemicals go into our homes and end up in our dust.

To leave our descendants a livable world is not an act of kindness, generosity, or benevolence…it is merely the honoring of a basic general, negative responsibility not to allow our own pursuits to undercut the pre-conditions for decent societies in the future.

This ban is beyond due. Moving away from these chemicals toward safer alternatives is a win for all, this generation and next.

Product safety is not a political issue

During the vote, Commissioner Adler said that he holds strong to the belief that “product safety is not a partisan issue and should never politicized” after a statement from one of the two Republican Commissioners that granting this petition through a vote down party lines would turn the issue into a political football. Commissioner Robinson defended Adler, stating that she was “absolutely flummoxed” and had “absolutely no clue what the science of this petition and these flame retardants has to do with whether you’re a Democrat or Republican nor what it has to do with my term being potentially up.” The granting of a petition rooted in rigorous science is not a political action. However, obstructing this science-based rulemaking process would be.

While the CPSC has voted to begin the process of rulemaking to ban OFRs under the Federal Hazardous Substance Act and to convene a Chronic Hazard Advisory Panel, the Commission will be shifting its composition as Marietta Robinson’s term ends in September. It is possible that this scientific issue could become politicized once President Trump nominates a Republican to join the CPSC and take back the majority. In fact, chairwoman Buerkle even suggested that the ban be overruled once the Republicans take back the majority. President Trump intends to nominate corporate lawyer, Dana Baiocco, who has defended companies that have faced charges regarding safety and misleading advertising of consumer and industrial products and medical devices.

We urge the Commission to continue the progress begun during yesterday’s vote to educate the public about the risks of OFRs and to create the policy that will ban these chemicals in consumer products for good. Let’s let science, not politics, have the final word. Our children will thank us someday.

In 2015, Earthjustice and Consumer Federation of America, on behalf of a broad coalition of health, consumer, science and firefighter organizations, petitioned the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to ban a class of flame retardants, additive organohalogen flame retardants, from children’s products, furniture, mattresses, and electronic casings as hazardous substances.

Graphic: Consumer Federation of America

The CPSC is considering whether or not to grant the petition and held a public hearing yesterday, at which I testified regarding the risks of flame retardants in households and the way in which flame retardant manufacturers and their lead trade association, the American Chemistry Council (ACC), have fought hard to keep these hazardous products on the market. The ACC is not a stranger to using the disinformation playbook. As we documented in our 2015 report, Bad Chemistry, the ACC has wielded influence to delay and quash important safeguards on a long list of chemicals, has funded science to exaggerate the chemicals’ effectiveness at lowering fire risk, and has employed innocuous-sounding front groups to do its dirty work without disclosing its relationship. A 2012 Chicago Tribune series did an excellent job of bringing much of the trade association’s activities to light.

The Commission will vote next week to determine whether they will grant the petition and begin to develop proposed rulemaking to ban these chemicals. We hope that the Commission will heed the recommendations of a long list of scientists, public health, and legal experts who agree that the CPSC has the legal authority and the scientific backing to ban these chemicals.

My testimony is below.

Good afternoon, I would like to thank Chairwoman Buerkle and the CPSC Commissioners for the opportunity to testify before you today on this important issue. My name is Genna Reed. I am the science and policy analyst at the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists. With more than 500,000 members and supporters across the country, we are a national, nonpartisan, non-profit group, dedicated to improving public policy through rigorous and independent science. The Center for Science and Democracy at UCS advocates for improved transparency and integrity in our democratic institutions, especially those making science-based public policy decisions.

The Union of Concerned Scientists stands with other members of the scientific community in supporting this petition calling upon the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to declare organohalogen flame retardants (OFRs) as a hazardous class of chemicals and to ban their use in children’s products, furniture, mattresses and the casings surrounding electronics. The scientific evidence laid out in the petition supports this regulatory change. The CPSC has the authority to protect the public from toxic substances that “may cause substantial personal injury or substantial illness.”

Since the Center’s inception, we have worked to protect scientific integrity within the federal government and called attention to incidences of special interests mischaracterizing science to advocate for specific policy goals. The chemical industry and its trade association, the American Chemistry Council’s, work to sow doubt about the science revealing harms about chemicals’ impacts on our health, including flame retardants, is an egregious example of this inappropriate behavior.

The companies that manufacture OFRs have put significant time and money into distorting the scientific truth about these chemicals. As a 2012 Chicago Tribune investigative series noted, the chemical industry “has twisted research results, ignored findings that run counter to its aims and passed off biased, industry-funded reports as rigorous science.” In one case, manufacturers of flame retardants repeatedly pointed to a decades-old government study, arguing the results showed a 15-fold increase in time to escape fires when flame retardants were present. The lead author of the study, however, said industry officials “grossly distorted” the results and that “industry has used this study in ways that are improper and untruthful,” as the amount of flame retardant used in the tests was much greater than would be found in most consumer items. The American Chemistry Council has further misrepresented the science behind flame retardants by creating an entire website to spread misleading ideas about flame retardants as safe and effective, even though research has consistently shown their limited effectiveness. In doing so, the American Chemistry Council and its member companies have promoted the prevalent use of OFRs at the expense of public health.

Looking at these chemicals through a strictly objective lens illustrates the need for CPSC’s swift action. Toxicity and exposure data support the assessment of organohalogen flame retardants as a class of chemicals under the Federal Hazardous Substances Act (FHSA). Properties that are shared by OFRs include their semivolatility and ability to migrate from consumer products into house dust and exposure has been associated with a range of health impacts including reproductive impairment, neurological impacts, endocrine disruption, genotoxicity, cancer, and immune disorders. As a class, there is an adequate body of evidence supporting the conclusion that these chemicals have the “capacity to cause personal illness” and therefore meet the definition of “toxic” under FHSA. Perhaps most egregiously, biomonitoring data have revealed that communities of color and low-income communities are disproportionately exposed to and bear high levels of flame retardant chemicals, adding to the cumulative chemical burden that these communities are already experiencing, from increased fine particulate matter from power plants or refineries in their neighborhoods to higher levels of contaminants in their drinking water.

I’ve seen firsthand the persistence of the earliest form of flame retardants, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), that still plague the sediment and water of the Hackensack Meadowlands just a couple of miles from where I grew up in New Jersey. One of my first jobs was working in the chemistry division of the Meadowlands Environmental Research Institute where I spent my days extracting PCBs and organochlorine pesticides from the soil and sediment of the Meadowlands and analyzing that data. Despite being banned in 1977, these chemicals are still found in dangerously high amounts all over industrial hotspots of the country, and continue to bioaccumulate in a range of species. The ban of PCBs happened decades ago and we are still managing the damaging impacts of the chemical’s prevalence across the country. The next generation of these chemicals, organohalogen flame retardants, are inside of our own homes in a range of products, thanks largely in part to the disinformation campaign sowed by special interests. The fact remains that the science does not support their continued use.

Seeing firsthand the persistence of PCBs in my local environment inspired me to use my scientific training to work to design or improve policies that minimize public health and environmental risks to prevent future scenarios of chemicals overburdening ecosystems and households. That is why I’m here today to ask the CPSC to act with urgency to grant this petition and further regulate OFRs to protect our children and future generations.

Here at the Center for Science and Democracy, we have been writing a lot lately about the importance of federal science advice and defending the value of advisory committees like the EPA’s Board of Scientific Counselors and EPA Science Advisory Board (SAB) against threats of budget cuts and reform. When I saw that the full SAB would be meeting at the end of August, I jumped at the opportunity to attend so that I could share some highlights of the proceedings and go beyond the static information that meeting transcripts convey.

As the EPA administrator’s primary science advisors, the purpose of this SAB meeting was for the group to meet in person to discuss some ongoing work. This included a review of a draft SAB report on economy-wide modeling of the benefits and costs of environmental regulation; a review of a draft SAB report on the framework for assessing biogenic carbon dioxide emissions from stationary sources; and a review of a draft review of EPA’s draft risk assessment on a munitions chemical, Hexahydro-1,3,5-trinitro-1,3,5-triazine, known as RDX. That’s a lot of reviews! The SAB also heard a briefing from the EPA’s Center for Environmental Assessment and the Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) on how they are operationalizing systematic review to increase transparency, efficiency, and access to risk assessment products.

The 47 members, both in the room and on the phone, were ready to dive into conversations that for many of them, were slightly outside of their bailiwicks. Expertise in the room ranged from agricultural economists to pulmonary toxicologists to civil and environmental engineers, taking on issues running the gamut from the viability and longevity of economy-wide modeling and what research questions would help to improve EPA’s ability to predict the economic benefits of its regulation, to the importance of training EPA staff to conduct better and more standardized risk assessments without adding years onto their workloads.

Transparency and accessibility at the forefront

A strong commitment to transparency was a theme throughout the meeting. The first matter of business was to announce that a couple of members would be recusing themselves because of a potential conflict of interest. One of these members is affiliated with ExxonMobil and therefore removed himself from the discussion about biogenic carbon dioxide emissions, since Exxon is likely to be financially impacted by policy decisions on the matter. With clear disclosure of and checks on financial conflicts of interest, and a balanced composition, federal advisory committees like the SAB are able to operate harmoniously with members with a range of affiliations, including industry, the nonprofit sector, state government, and academia.

Accessibility is also a major consideration for the SAB, and they seem genuinely interested in making their reports easier for their general readership to digest and improving the transparency of their processes. The SAB not only was interested in the way that their own reports were used by the public, but their commitment to accessibility was clear in their recommendations to the agency as well.

As a member of the public, there was no registration required, but there was a sign-in sheet before entering the conference room and plenty of room to sit and watch the meeting of great science minds. There was even coffee made available for all! Public attendees came and went as the day wore on, but at most times there were about 20 people in the room, most of whom were interested EPA staffers eager to hear advice from these trusted counselors.

The meeting began promptly in the morning and ran through the packed agenda smoothly, thanks to the Designated Federal Officer’s leadership—he’s the EPA staff person who is responsible for ensuring that the committee is operating according to the Federal Advisory Committee Act—and the SAB chair, who leads the committee through the agenda and facilitates the meeting.

Discussions on the different agenda items were organized and thoughtful, and there was opportunity for public comment on each piece so that interested parties could give the SAB their feedback. Several members of the public had comments on the biogenic emissions report, including some critiques of the short timeline given to the public to review the document. The opportunity for the SAB to hear from members of the public and refer to their testimony throughout the proceedings is incredibly valuable and a testament to the importance of these public meetings on a regular basis to keep the advisors grounded.

A few major takeaways

The day-and-a-half meeting was chock-full of acronyms (both for agency offices and for indecipherable chemical names) and highly technical scientific jargon, and admittedly not the easiest for a member of the public to access fully without a 2-month primer on the ins and outs of biogenic emissions. However, attending this meeting allowed me to fully understand what it means to have a group of the country’s premier scientists in one room discussing scientific issues. It’s an all-star team of brilliant minds. At the end of the day, the EPA administrator could feel the utmost confidence that questions posed to this group have been carefully considered and conclusions come to with pointed discourse.

These scientists certainly do not always agree, but they talk about their disagreements and call each other out if they feel that a characterization is incorrect or off the mark in some way. They try to look at each charge question from all sides and from all disciplines, so nothing is left out of the equation. They respect one another as colleagues and as friends. At the end of the last day, there was a touching toast to celebrate the SAB chair, whose term will be coming to an end in September.

Appointments to the SAB and other federal advisory committees are taken seriously by those afforded the opportunity, and it’s no wonder. What better way for scientists to challenge themselves in a new setting by applying their expertise to support federal policy?

What is frustrating, however, is that Administrator Pruitt has so far not been involved with the SAB besides sending them a spring 2017 regulatory agenda, which includes EPA regulatory and deregulatory actions, for the SAB to review. The SAB plans to share some of their priorities with Pruitt and invite him to the next full board meeting. Seeing as Pruitt has already been a party to several incidents of sidelining science, including his plan for a “red team/blue team” exercise on climate change, he could clearly benefit from some science advice that doesn’t come directly from special interest talking points.

After hearing from the EPA’s IRIS division director and learning about how quickly staff has been implementing National Academies of Science recommendations to strengthen its review process, there was a motion from SAB members to inform Pruitt of the value of IRIS. This is especially timely given that this week, the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee, led by longtime IRIS critic Representative Lamar Smith, will hold a hearing to review the “integrity” of the division.

I would hope that those who have been critical of the SAB would attend a meeting so that the notion that these scientists are “conflicted” is laid to rest. Conflicts of interest are taken care of at the outset of the meeting, and the rest of the conversation has nothing to do with employer or political party or who’s occupying the White House. The only thing that matters to these individuals is being scientifically accurate and helping the agency to meet its mission. So next time you hear something or read something that categorizes SAB members as having agendas or lacking scientific integrity, try to remember that this job is actually just about the science. Let’s keep it that way.

]]>https://blog.ucsusa.org/genna-reed/science-advice-in-action-highlights-from-an-epa-science-advisory-board-meeting/feed0https://blog.ucsusa.org/genna-reed/science-advice-in-action-highlights-from-an-epa-science-advisory-board-meetingAn Administration Defined by Its Conflicts (and What That Means for Science and Policy)http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheEquationGennaReed/~3/jIYhJJMwD_M/trump-six-months
https://blog.ucsusa.org/genna-reed/trump-six-months#respondFri, 21 Jul 2017 13:54:07 +0000http://blog.ucsusa.org/?p=52666

Photo: The White House/Flickr

The first six months of President Trump’s time in office have consisted of a whirlwind of questionable governing decisions. From the outset, the Center for Science and Democracy established a baseline of the types of protections for science within the federal government that should be maintained by the Executive Office of the President; to say that the Trump Administration is not up to the mark would be a gross understatement.

What democracy is and isn’t

Since the Trump Administration took office, the balance between public and private control of government has been skewed in favor of industry interests, at the expense of the protections that keep us safe and healthy. Is this means of governance characteristic of a functional democracy?

A democracy at its roots is a government by the people and for the people. The US government was designed to support the public good and the will of all, not the will of a select few.

This conflict between serving all and serving the powerful few is one that all US presidents have faced during their tenure. Franklin D. Roosevelt spoke to Congress in April 1938 about the importance of curbing monopolies, saying:

“The first truth is that the liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. The second truth is that the liberty of a democracy is not safe if its business system does not provide employment and produce and distribute goods in such a way as to sustain an acceptable standard of living.”

He continued:

“We believe in a way of living in which political democracy and free private enterprise for profit should serve and protect each other—to ensure a maximum of human liberty not for a few but for all.”

Photo: UCS/John Finch

Strong science-based public protections and a thriving business community are not mutually exclusive. Yet, under the Trump Administration, important safeguards are being recklessly cut in the name of efficiency. In employing the strategic counsel from former industry lobbyists and choosing to roll back, delay, or otherwise weaken rules that curb the ability of these companies to pollute and harm us, the Trump Administration is acting to undermine the role of evidence, reason, and the will of the public within this democracy we have fought so hard to institute and maintain.

What ever happened to draining the swamp?

The Director of the Office of Government Ethics (OGE), Walter Shaub, resigned earlier this month. In his resignation letter, he wrote, “The great privilege and honor of my career has been to lead OGE’s staff and the community of ethics officials in the federal executive branch. They are committed to protecting that public service is a public trust, requiring employees to place loyalty to the Constitution, the laws, and ethical principles above private gain.”

As its name suggests, The Office of Government Ethics is responsible for preventing conflicts of interest within the federal government. Shaub told the New York Times that there wasn’t much more he could accomplish in the office “given the current situation,” likely responding to the way in which President Trump has taken office with an unprecedented list of personal financial conflicts and a cabinet with extensive industry ties, despite campaigning on a promise to drain the proverbial DC swamp of corporate lobbyists.

In sum, the Trump administration is disproportionately considering the policy agenda of the private sector, while neglecting the real-life implications of allowing corporations to operate without proper checks.

The trump administration’s decisions are impacting peoples’ lives

Despite a wealth of scientific evidence linking chlorpyrifos with neurotoxic impacts on children and adults, the pesticide is still used on corn, soybeans, fruit and nut trees, certain vegetables including Brussels sprouts and broccoli, and other crops. Photo: USDA/Flickr

The clear conflicts of interest of the President and his cabinet, combined with the lack of transparency that has thus far been characteristic of the administration, have created large vulnerabilities for science-based policy in this administration. While industry awaits its chance to profit from regulatory rollbacks both here and abroad, a regulatory freeze, and industry-friendly cabinet appointments, the rest of us are missing out on unrealized health and safety benefits.

Yudith Nieto from Manchester, Texas was among the members of the public who made a public comment at EPA’s hearing in June regarding the proposed delay of the rule. She told agency officials:

“We have over a thousand refineries in the Houston area, as you may know, and I think you’ve probably heard throughout the day, I am sure of people that reported the work that they have been doing, the research work, the legal work that they are doing to support communities like the community of Manchester, all around the country. And we depend on these kinds of rules and regulations to try to protect our communities, our children, people who live right next to refineries, pipelines, tank farms, and other exposures. With everything that’s happening right now in the country, we fear more for our lives, we fear or our livelihoods, we fear for our health, because we see that a lot of these Rules are being attacked.”

As the Department of Labor stalls implementing stricter exposure standards for silicaand beryllium rules, the labor force in metal foundries and construction sites will continue to be exposed to levels of those chemicals that could result in eventual silicosis or chronic beryllium diseases.

Eddie Mallon worked in New York City tunnel construction for over forty years before being diagnosed with silicosis. When asked how the disease has changed his life at a 2014 hearing for the rule, he told OSHA staff:

“Well, yeah, I loved playing sports, but I can’t do that with the silicosis. It’s a problem. I like working around the house. It affects me. Playing with my grandchildren affects me. It has all different ways to affect you. I mean, you know, I’m 70. I may look a little younger than what I look, but my lungs, I’m sure, are a lot older than that. It’s a hidden disease, silicosis.”

He worries about the next generation without a stronger exposure standard:

“I strongly believe OSHA needs to implement strong silica standards. We need them and especially in my industry. I do believe that 50 years down the line, you will never see a 70-year-old man sitting up here talking about silica if things don’t change. These young kids today, what they’re going to face down the hole is nothing [like] what I did. For the first 30 years of working the tunnels, it was bad with the silica, but nowhere near what it’s like today.”

And as the Food and Drug Administration gives food manufacturers more time before enforcing revised nutrition facts labels with a line for added sugars, parents will remain in the dark on how much sugar is added to their children’s food. Alec Bourgeois, a DC dad, shares what the delays mean for his family:

“You can think that you are making reasonable, healthy decisions and realize later that you are absolutely eating junk and it’s incredibly frustrating…So much of the things that didn’t used to have sugar in them now have sugar in them. Like tomato sauce for example. There’s going to be some sugar in the tomato but they are also adding five or six tablespoons of sugar on top of that.”

While we’ve had some victories in stopping the Administration from making ill-advised policy decisions, we need to continue to monitor the horizon and fight back when science is attacked, misused, or ignored by our government.

Sign up here to join the vanguard of watchdogs poised to help us with this mighty task, and to read more about how the Administration has sidelined science so that powerful interests can push forward their own agendas, check out our new report here.